"An escort mission sounds good to me," I told Minato.
We were standing before the Hokage, discussing possible missions. Minato, Kosuke, and I were on a team, led by Minato himself.
"We'll meet at the village entrance in one hour," said the ladybug, looking at the mission scroll.
The mission involved an escort to a village near the hot springs village. It was a shipment a villager had purchased in Konoha for his village. It was a C-rank mission, which could easily be downgraded to B-rank during wartime.
"Understood," said Crazy Eyes and I. And so we each went our separate ways.
Three days had passed since the conversation with the mummy, and I could already sense someone following me.
I ended up in the woods in the middle of the training grounds.
"Appear before me now," I said.
At that moment, six tools appeared in a line before me. Four male tools and two female ones.
"Who is the squad leader?" I asked. One tool stepped forward.
"From now on, it will be 0," I told the team leader. And I began pointing from left to right. "And you will be 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, since I like odd numbers," I announced.
"Understood, miss," the six said in unison.
"What were Danzo's instructions?" I asked again.
"Follow any order from him as long as it doesn't affect the village or the Root," they replied simultaneously.
"Alright, now each of you will tell me your specializations and your role in the team," I instructed them.
"My specialty is ninjutsu, and my role is to be a sensor, tracking and coordinating attacks," said Tool 0.
"My specialty is bukijutsu, and my role is elimination," said Tool 1.
"My specialty is taijutsu, and my role is to be the vanguard," said Tool 2.
"My specialty is genjutsu, and my role is the rearguard," said Tool 3.
"My specialty is ninjutsu, and my role is siege warfare," said Tool 4.
"My specialty is my clan's ninjutsu, and my role is intelligence gathering," the last tool finally stated.
"What is your fifth clan?" I asked.
"I belong to the Yamanaka clan, my lady. "A good addition to the squad; I hope he's good at what he does.
"Does anyone else belong to a special clan?" I asked the others.
"I belong to the Kurama clan," said Number 3.
"And I to the Senju clan," said Number 4.
I didn't care that Number 4 was from the Senju clan, since it was known that Danzo had ninjas from different clans in his Root group, the only exceptions being the Uchiha and Hyuga.
"Well, I have an escort mission in the Land of Hot Springs; your mission is to retrieve all the Uzumaki clan items they managed to take when they attacked the village; once I have them, they'll return to me, understood?"
"Yes, miss," the six said.
"Good, the mission will begin when we enter the country, and everyone except Number 2 will carry it out. Number 2 will stay with me on guard." I gave the order.
I'm not going to risk nothing going wrong on the mission, so I'll have a pawn who can be sacrificed so my team and I can survive.
And with that, the six ninjas vanished into their positions.
Now I'll see how they perform in action; then I'll see if I can increase their efficiency, and maybe later I'll ask the old mummy for an aburame or a nara for the squad.
I don't care if they succeed or not; if they don't, I'll leave a clone on the escort mission and go with them, but I want to see how they handle themselves; after all, I'm the squad commander, not the leader.
...
"It was pretty easy; I was expecting a big battle or something, an S-rank ninja lurking around a corner waiting to pounce," Kosuke said in his monotone Uchiha voice.
"I think your mind's still on the front lines; I can ask Uncle Hokage to send you back there if you want," I told Crazy Eyes.
"What do you mean? It was just a figure of speech, yeah, a joke; it's not that big of a deal," he said nervously, rubbing the scar over his eye.
"Well, I think with four or five missions like this, plus what we did on the front lines, he'll be ready to be promoted to Chunin on merit." I took the opportunity to talk to Minato as we returned to the village after our successful mission.
During the journey, we have only encountered samurai and bandits so far. It turned out to be a true C-rank mission, something we'd never seen before.
(Note: I think there are very few C-rank missions in Naruto fanfiction; they're all A or S rank. Obviously, this is sarcasm, but it's not far from the truth.)
As we continued our journey, leaping through the trees, I wondered if the tools had accomplished their purpose.
...
It took four days for them to arrive, but only three of those days were actually spent with 0, 3, and 5. We presumed 1 and 4 dead, but they achieved their objective; they arrived with ten Uzumaki clan scrolls.
"Were those all they had?" I asked, curious.
"Yes, my lady," said 0.
I looked at the scrolls; most of them contained sealed information. It would take me a few days to decipher it, mainly because I have been busy training my Wood Release style these days, and I dedicate several days to it, taking advantage of being alone at home.
Kushin had already graduated and was on a genin team, which gave me more time at home alone.
After the mission, Minato gave us five days of rest; the mission itself lasted four days due to the slow pace of our journey to the Land of Hot Springs.
"Everything was done cleanly, right? There's no way they'll find out you did it?" I asked.
"No way. The bodies of 1 and 4 were designed to explode upon death, just like everyone else's, including mine," he replied.
"Perfect. Rest for the rest of the day, and while you're at it, inform Danzo about this and have him bring more men to replace those who died. Also, tell him that once I have these stickers disguised, I'll go there to see what can be done about this." Obviously, I was keeping the best ones I could find.
"Understood, miss," the four of them said at once, disappearing in a flash.
"Well, it's better if you call me Miss than Princess Senju," I said, going into the house to look at the stickers.
...
I had already deciphered six of the ten scrolls, which didn't contain much: basic sealing techniques, some basic ninjutsu, some fire-element techniques, and some water-element techniques. I don't mind giving these things to Danzo, since they'll eventually come back to me.
But what was on scroll number six was different. It was a katana, and according to what was written there, it was a weapon inherited from the nobility of the Village Hidden in the Whirlpools. It has chakra-conducting metal and a unique characteristic, just like the weapons of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist.
It has the ability to assimilate elemental chakra. Basically, if I imbue it with earth-element chakra, it becomes as strong as diamond. If it's a water-element chakra, it will be enveloped in a thin layer of water capable of cutting through anything, like water at full pressure. The same thing happens with fire, wind, and lightning. Now the interesting thing is what happens with the bloodlines, what happens if I use the wood element on the sword.
I'll look into that later; right now I'm going to look at the other scrolls. It's worth mentioning that I'll keep the weapon; Danzo doesn't use weapons, and it fits better in my hands than in any of his tools.
The day after my squad arrived, 0 told me to go and look at the two possible tools to replace 1 and 4 in the equipment as soon as I could. I'll do that when I finish here.
After an hour of deciphering scroll number 7, I managed to open it, and the information was more important than I thought.
It talks about the Shinigami mask, how it worked, and how to avoid death when performing the Reaper Death Seal, not to mention how to perform the jutsu.
I don't know if this scroll will end up in Konoha's or Orochimaru's hands; in that case, there might be other scrolls that talk about it, but for now, I have this one, and that's that. This is too dangerous for Danzo to have.
I took some scrolls from Grandma Mito of the Uzumaki clan that weren't very important; they talked about bloodlines and such, and I didn't really care if Danzo had them, so I swapped them. I imagine he must already know about the bloodlines of every corner of this village and some others as well.
...
"Here are the nine deciphered scrolls," he said, handing the scrolls to Danzo.
"And the tenth?" he asked as he opened the scrolls.
"It's here," I said, showing him the katana. "I'll keep it for the trouble of opening the ten encrypted scrolls."
"Alright, but give me the information on how the weapon works," he said, looking at the weapon.
"No problem," I said as I sat down in an armchair I had requested be installed in Danzo's office in the gloomy root.
No sooner had I sat down than one tool was handing me orange juice and another a lemon pie.
Danzo looked at this, slightly irritated, but said nothing and just continued staring at the scrolls.
"That was a good use you made of the squad; it's something everyone should do, a mission within a mission, extracting information, stealing from other villages, and, if possible, leaving them even more in decline than they already are," he said, setting the scrolls aside. "It's a shame the scrolls didn't yield any truly relevant information; that must be in Kumo and Kiri's hands."
"Perhaps," I simply replied.
"Well, let's talk about the other matter. I imagine you want other Root ninjas to replace the ones you acquired, right?" he asked me.
"Yes, if possible, I'd like to have a Nara and an Aburame," I told him honestly.
"I hardly have any Nara ninjas, and I use them for specific things, but I can give you an Aburame. As for the other one, I have a Root ninja who specializes in infiltration and data collection; he'll be useful if you keep doing missions like this."
You can't always have what you want; you just have to accept what you can have.
"While I have missions and find promising tools to add to my squad, could I take them on?" I asked the mummy.
"As long as they go through the Root protocol, it's fine," he replied.
"Thanks, Uncle Danzo, you're the best uncle I have," I said with a smile.
"Obviously I'm better than that monkey," he said with a grin.
Sure, whatever you say, Mummy.
...
"Introduce yourselves, new recruits," I said to the two new tools in the squad.
"My specialty is insect ninjutsu from my clan; my role is assassination and tracking," said the Aburame clan member.
"Good, you'll be number 1 from now on. What about you?" I said, looking at the newcomer.
"My specialty is bukijutsu, and my role is infiltration and gathering," said the tool.
"Good, you'll be number 4 from now on. For now, stay close to my perimeter in case I call you, as I won't allow you to stagnate and remain mediocre like the rest of the tools. My job is for you to become the best squad in Root and for all of you to be elite ninjas capable of outshining any ninja in this village, understood?" he said, like a military sergeant.
"Yes, my lady," they said simultaneously.
"Good, tomorrow the hellish training begins, but first things first." I said, "Number 4."
"Yes, my lady," Tool 4 replied.
"Go to the village's slums and check the most vulnerable areas. Identify the people who might be susceptible to influence and tell me who they are. I want the entire area identified: the places with the highest concentration of people and groups, whether criminal or not, and the most frequented areas. I want it all. You have three days. Don't fail me," I ordered.
"Yes, my lady," and with that, it left with a flash of sunlight.
"The rest of you can leave. If I need you, I'll call you."
"Yes," they said, leaving as well. "Leave me alone."
"Well, I think I'll take advantage of this time to continue training my Wood Release," I said as I began stretching.
If I want to control the village, I have to start with the slums. I think I should create a group to control the entire area, backed up by my squad. It won't be too difficult as long as we do it discreetly.
"I think I should create a group to control the whole place, backed up by my squad. It won't be too difficult as long as we do it discreetly."
"Yes, my lady," I said, and with that, it left with a flash of sunlight.
"The rest of you can leave. If I have to do it, I have to start with the slums." Controlling civilians is just as important as controlling ninjas.